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Triple World RX champion Kristoffersson to switch to Audi

Triple World Rallycross Champion Johan Kristoffersson will switch to an Audi S1 and the EKS JC team in his bid to win a fourth crown this year.

Watch: WRX: Kristoffersson to switch to Audi

Kristoffersson will campaign the S1 in his first rallycross season racing anything other than a Volkswagen since his debut in the discipline in 2013.

EKS JC, an amalgamation of Mattias Ekstrom's EKS outfit and Joel Christoffersson's JC Raceteknik squad, which won the World RX Teams' title last year with Ekstrom and Robin Larsson, will field Kristoffersson and Belgian Enzo Ide for its World RX effort this year.

Kristoffersson's three World RX Drivers' titles in four years were at the wheel of Volkswagen Motorsport-built Polos, for the first two years run under by Petter Solberg's PSRX Volkswagen Sweden banner then last year within the Kristoffersson Motorsport family team, following a year away from the series for the Swede.

"First of all, I'm very pleased that I can contest a full World RX season, and to do so with a new team is like a new challenge for me," said 32-year-old Kristoffersson, who has a record 24 World RX event wins to his credit.

"EKS JC know how to win races and championships, and after our first two test days we saw that we could learn and gain from each other.

"Joel Christoffersson and the whole team are very passionate and motivated to achieve the goal of defending my Drivers' title and, together with Enzo, also the Teams' title.

"The target when you enter a championship as the reigning champion is always to win it again, but that's certainly no easy task. The competition will always be there and – because rallycross is rallycross – there will always be a lot of action.

"We fully expect to have to fight hard, but we are ready for that and I really, really can't wait to get to the first event with my new car and see where we are at."

Kristoffersson currently leads the Extreme E series after two rounds together with team mate Molly Taylor and already tested the EKS-built S1, initially at a rain-soaked Holjes in Sweden the day after racing in the fourth round of RallyX Nordic in Mid-May.

"If you can't beat him, join him – it's as simple as that," said Kristoffersson's closest rival for the 2020 World RX crown and EKS JC joint-owner, Mattias Ekstrom.

"I have had many great battles with Johan and I think everyone can agree he has a unique skillset, so for me, he is a perfect fit for EKS JC's 2021 campaign to once again challenge the rest of the field for both the Teams' and Drivers' titles."

Ekstrom drove one of his team's S1s to the World RX Drivers' crown in 2016, the same year that EKS secured the Teams' title, a feat it repeated together with JC Raceteknik last season.

Kristoffersson's father Tommy previously raced Audis in the European Rallycross Championship through the 1990s and claimed a final victory at his home circuit, Arvika in Sweden in 1998.

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